Eyes on the Prize

Charging effortlessly through the heavy metal door Ramona stampeded wildly into the room, her thick muscles tightened in frustration with blood and rage seeping across her face. The rampaging goddess stomped with menacing purpose straight forward, forcing Troy to frantically toss himself to the side as she passed lest he be trampled in her wild tracks. Animalistic snarls and screams bellowed forth as she collided with the far wall of the room, pounding and kicking the concrete uncontrollably till her fists left dark prints of blood in their wake. The sincere untamed power of her yells pushed back against Troy and the frightened fan retreated timidly to the far corner of the room to witness the athletes flailing in terrible awe.

Yet all the chaos of her thrashing could not come close to representing the storming violence in her mind. No longer did any coherent thoughts exist within her, only unfiltered primitive emotions raged in her skull. Twin beasts of pride and shame clawed each other viciously, her perfect win record flailing humiliatingly as it was stabbed and slashed by her first ever professional loss. The specter of failure stood above in the shape of a fat goliath of darkness, bloated with malicious laughter; it curled itself around her wounded pride and ego, muffling their frail wailing beneath heavy folds of shadow as it ground them to dust with grotesque pleasure. The indelible fire at her core which had thus far fueled the entire motion of her life now coughed and sputtered sickly, stamped out by the encroaching darkness of doubt.

Ramona reared back and slammed her fists and head into the wall with bone-cracking fury, angling her powerful body to push her full strength and weight against it. The three impacts happened simultaneously and boomed together as a single dense entity that thundered violently around the room. Any pain her body experienced was swiftly washed away by the athletes ongoing wrath as she continued to push herself against the wall. Her whole body tensed as prodigious muscles crested from beneath her rich dark skin, the smooth wide mountains of her calves and thighs especially straining as they attempted in vain to move her forward.

Her wide burning eyes smoldered into the empty wall but the only visage available to the athlete was the gloating pompous impudent shit eating smile of Jacklyn Vargas, etched into her mind forever more as standing over her looking every bit as solid, strong, and unconquerable as the concrete now before her. That damned smile of hers still seemed to dart around Ramona in wild illogical patterns like an annoying insect. All of her focused energy and viciousness had ended up with nowhere to land as Jacklyn had floated away from her every attack with infuriating ease. Through the entirety of the first two rounds Ramona chased the champion to all four corners of the ring, unleashing a constant flurry of power and fury in a tireless attempt to overwhelm her opponents defences. All of her past victories and accomplishments, all her training, every moment of her career was put into every last punch. Yet to the amazement of the crowd Jacklyn seemed almost indifferent to the assault. Twisting and shifting like smoke in the breeze of Ramona's fists, the reigning champ was more than content to let the frenzied athlete tire herself out. In smooth dancing movements Jacklyn led her challenger on an endless circular chase, more resembling a cartoonish slapstick routine than a fight.

With every elapsed second and each punch wasted on the air Ramona felt bubbles of impatience and anger boil up from within her core. Obviously she recognized Jacklyn's strategy to wear out her energy and focus, it was the standard defence against fighters like herself that specialized in quick fierce bouts. She had fully anticipated that Jacklyn would attempt to give her the runaround like the coward she was, but simply never expected her to be so adept at it. The champion moved that night like no one had seen a human move before. Stepping effortlessly between the adrenaline soaked seconds of the clock she weaved herself gracefully through the air, appearing to the cameras as a smooth blurry brush stroke across the night itself. More and more wisps of frustration steamed out from between Ramona's clenched teeth as she chased Jacklyns' ghostly after image. Beads of sweat and panic formed on her brow as she realized her energy reserves were nearing their limit, the adrenaline and electricity of the moment made her practically numb to her body's tiredness but she knew that the viciousness of her current assault was quickly becoming unsustainable. Already she could feel her movements falling behind her reflexes, every step and strike taking slightly longer to come out than the last. Soon she would come undone. Her solid statuesque physique threatened to diffuse back into its individual elements, mere muscles and bones and ligaments grinding against themselves discordantly.

But in that moment she was able to hold together, weaving the comforting thought of her secret strategy around herself. Her narrowed hawkish eyes held tight to her opponent, waiting for Jacklyn's signature slip up. Throughout the blazing pace of the fight the champion had never lost her smile, that thin smirking grin that forever adorned her punchable face. She was enjoying their match and that was why Ramona knew she would lose. Any moment could be the one, the single second where Jacklyn would give into her instincts and gloat. A glance to the cameras, a wave to the fans, just one wayward move was all Ramona needed to teach that bitch the difference between a wannabe starlet and a true athlete. Once that moment came she'd break that grin, pry it open into a wide chasm tearing through that proud impenetrable facade.

Towards the end of the third round it finally came. Spinning away from Ramona's pistoning fist in a movement worthy of ballet, Jacklyn spread her thin fluttering lips in a silent toothy laugh and chanced throwing a sunny look off to the sidelines.

Ramona's heart stopped. All sounds faded away and that single second stretched out indefinitely. Whoever or whatever it was that Jackie was smiling towards, Ramona hoped it was worth losing a championship over. Without thought or feeling the eager fighter put into action what she had rehearsed countless times in training, and even more times in her dreams. Leaning into her opponent's momentary blind spot Ramona reeled back her thick chiseled arm, veins and tendons bulging from beneath her dark skin in anticipation. An excited leap forward sent her rocketing into motion; trails of sparks and fire clung desperately to her arm in an attempt to keep up with the screaming momentum of her meteoric fist.

Upon her final approach to the shorter fighter, her normally stoic exterior began to burn away in the heat of the moment's atmosphere. First a few chips flaked off, the widening of her eyes betraying a genuine giddiness within her heart. A subtle calmness flowed through her, the sensation of victory enraptured her every cell, bringing her entire being to buzz contentedly. Finally her hardened shell burst apart and in that moment the crowd and the cameras witnessed for the first time a wide earnest smile reaching across Ramona's face, gripping tightly to each of her bubbly cheeks in order to smother her dour face in a warm bear hug. Ramona funneled all her strength and motion into the upswing of her arm and knew that she had won.

Jacklyn however was experiencing the exact same sentiment as she snapped closed the hinges of her expertly laid trap. A simple twist of the hips traveled down her titanic legs and swiftly rearranged her footing, one heel dug into the mat to bring her movement to a screeching halt and reversed her momentum as though she had bounced against a solid surface. In a moment that would live on long after both fighters would eventually hang up their gloves, Jacklyn beamed directly into the nearest camera and winked playfully as the arm previously hanging relaxed at her side shot out towards Ramona in a blind faith punch. All she had to do then was brace herself as she felt her challenger run face first into the outstretched first, their deadly uppercut swinging just an inch too short to make contact and spiraling harmlessly away above Ramona's head.

That one punch stopped Ramona dead in her tracks, her own forward momentum used

against her. Body, soul, and career crumpled agonizingly against her opponents fist, that soft elusive smile now monstrously deformed by the shape of Jacklyn's glove. Ramona had taken hits before, harder much more vicious ones than the casual lazy strike now buried in her face, but she had always been ready for them. Caught unaware the normally insurmountable giant of a woman crumpled backwards, her composure and cockiness flung into the night alongside a spray of errant sweat drops ripped from her body by the sudden change in direction. Seeking to ensure her victory, Jacklyn followed after her opponent's staggering body unleashing a staccato flurry of punches to Ramona's exposed head. A great heap of limbs and muscles avalanche unceremoniously to the mat before the enraptured crowd. By the time Ramona was able to scramble to her knees she was struck again by the final and most painful blow of the night, the deep warbling bellow of the ringside bell declaring her as knocked out.

Limply slumped against the locker room wall like a discarded sweat rag, her body still quivered violently with the reverberations of that haunting resonance. Ramona curled herself into a shivering puddle of misery, all fire and passion that once resided in her extinguished into weak whispering sobs that wafted sadly into the air around her. Slowly she became quiet, her beaten sweaty form ceasing all action and movement save for the occasional twitching heave of her prolonged weeping.

Having been shoved into the far corner by the oppressive tension and panic of the moment, Troy stared nervously at the woman that less than an hour ago had been his idol. Though perhaps not the most intelligent person, Troy had little trouble inferring what could have happened to reduce his revered goddess into the pathetic wreck before him. A maelstrom of conflicted thoughts and feelings whirled in his chest, clawing him from the inside. He had worshiped this woman until less than an hour ago, and even with that traumatically passionless sex stamped freshly in his mind a deep part of him still clung to her. Far inside his chest he still clung at least to the idea of her. His more conscious mind however warned him to escape while he had the chance. Ramona's mask was gone, her beautiful veneer forever melted away in his eyes by her newly revealed toxicity. She was a predator, his mind whispered to itself. She was a spoiled diva, a dangerous monster.

Troy flicked his eyes towards the heavy metal door that served as his only exit route. Only the thick stillness of the air stood in his path towards it giving him a clear shot to freedom, if he moved quietly enough he could probably take his leave without Ramona even noticing he was still in the room with her. Several moments passed before he willed himself to break free of the entwining tendrils of fear and doubt that had kept him huddled in place and began to crawl towards the door in as inconspicuous a manner as possible. As he moved slowly forward the stifling warm air brushing against every available inch of his skin suddenly reminded him he was still nude. Spying his discarded clothing towards the middle of the room he reluctantly shifted his trajectory to take him back towards the low metal bench that had been the stage for his deflowering. Keeping sure to position the bench between him and the slumped mass of muscles he once adored, he gathered up his jeans, socks, and shoes. Reaching for his shirt he pondered whether it was worth the risk of staying within the locker room to get dressed or if he should take his chances fumbling his clothes back on as swiftly as possible once he had escaped, only to have all thought and movement interrupted upon looking down at his prized garment.

As he had lifted the shirt up from its piled up position on the floor its golden folds had unfurled, freeing the image of the sport star emblazoned on its front. Another whirlwind kicked up inside him, bringing back the feelings that image used to give him. Comparing the fierce unflappable woman made up of fabric and paint on the t-shirt with the flesh and blood whimpering creature before him, he realized that the woman on the shirt was not Ramona Bell and it in fact never had been. What he held in his hand was manufactured, something he had purchased to try to be closer to his idol but that was in fact designed to keep her separate from him. His mind again used this to turn him away from the athlete, a feeling akin to having been lied to.

But still from deep within rose an enduring sort of love, riding on his breath into and surrounding his body. This time his feelings were scented with an extra fragrance of empathy. Ramona was not the figure on his shirt, she was the one that now huddled below him. A lonely desperate figure drowning in misery and failure, the smooth dark curves of her typically grandiose frame now retracted fearfully in an undignified ball causing her shapely defined musculature to be smothered beneath waves of skin pushed out by limbs awkwardly mashing together. She was as strictly separated from others as much as she had kept them separated from her. Whether out of residual admiration or simple naiveté Troy decided against his better judgment that if he was truly Ramona's fan, if he ever had been at all, he owed it to her to do what he had mistakenly thought he had done long ago, to truly get to know who she was.

"Uh... Ms Bell?" he whispered in a quiet uncertain voice.

After several moments passed with only the collapsed athlete's uneven breathing as a reply the young fan fought through the fiery apprehension sizzling beneath his skin and slowly stepped over the bench to approach her.

"Are you going to be okay?" he said slightly louder, not knowing if she could hear him from the depths of her wallowing. Harnessing the entirety of his courage he addressed her again. "Ramona?"

Having still not provoked any discernible response Troy crouched beside his fallen goddess and looked over her sculpted form. As his eyes ran along the smooth steep hills of her impressive musculature a strange mixture of nostalgia and pity constricted his heart. In past images of her he had memorized those hills, worshiping the strong peaks of her body as well as the softer velvet valleys that he had just recently been fully exposed to for the first time. Now seeing her as a mere person he noticed the gentle quaking of her body rather than the prodigious muscles flowing beneath her skin, instead of idolizing the thick corded biceps of her arms he focused on the woman's grimacing face buried beneath them.

As a powerful wave of empathy flowed out from his core his hand was bravely carried onto her broad shoulder and he spoke with a semblance of actual confidence.

"Ramona".

A sharp intake of breath and the complete rigidity of her body greeted his touch. Through the heavy coating of sweat and the giving outer layer of skin he could feel the solid tension lurking beneath, a dense mass of ligaments and strife pushing back against his gentle fingers. Gradually Ramona uncurled herself just enough to peek a single eye out from between her tangled limbs, the drowning chestnut gem flickering between confusion and anger before finally surrendering itself to a tired apathy.

"It'll be okay..." Troy quickly got out before she was able to retreat back within herself. Hints of nervous uncertainty still flaked from his voice despite his best efforts to seem strong.

"The fuck do you know!" She curtly spat in retort. "Who do you think you fucking are to tell me anything right now!"

"I'm...I" with no inkling of how to proceed Troy decided to simply let the whirling emotions inside him flow out freely. "I'm your biggest fan".

Ramona choked up a guttural sound somewhere between a mock laugh and a derisive snort as she whacked Troy's hand away from her in an effortlessly harsh reminder of her dominating strength.

"Like I even have any fans after tonight..."

"What do you mean?" Troy ignored the sting in his forearm where she had swatted him and chanced sitting against the wall beside her, flinching slightly as his bare skin rubbed against the cold concrete.

"It's over. The bitch fucking beat me like I was nothing, so now that's what I am." She pulled herself up into a sitting position with her arms winding tightly around her knees. "I don't know how she did it but she..." Ramona glared straight ahead into a far off place as her words got caught in her throat, coming out uneven and shaking. "She wiped the goddamn floor with me. I blew my big chance... It's over. I'm over."

Troy watched the fighter carefully as she grumbled to herself, feeling the flames of turmoil and shame radiate outwards from her. An exponential tightness flowed steadily through her network of muscles, as they bulged outwards in an obscene rage.

"Ramona, I don't think that's how it works." He said in as kind and soft a manner as possible. "Everyone has losses now and then, but-"

"I don't!" She screamed, finally turning to burn him beneath her smoldering gaze. "That's my thing! That's all I had, it's what made me special. Its-"

"That's stupid Ramona." The boldness of his interruption as well as the confident flatness of his intonation shocked the both. "Everyone loses sometimes. And your wins are not what made you special."

Ramona's face was still frozen in the shape of her last previous syllable, occasionally twitching from the fiery ire that bubbled beneath its surface. Her heated glare stretched out over countless silent seconds, intensifying to such a degree that Troy felt an unbearable scorching burn run over him. Just as he began formulating an escape route the fighter mercifully flung her vision back towards the empty locker room to continue her self-flagellation.

"What the hell do you know? Winning was my brand, if I can't keep that up then what good am I? Who the hell'd want to cheer for me after the sorry-ass display I put on tonight?"

"I would of course." Troy assured her after several more tense empty moments. "You don't really think that people only come to fights just to see who wins, do you?"

The heat in Ramona's stare fizzled out to be replaced with a quizzical, almost contemptuous befuddlement as she swiveled her face back to Troy. Although less hostile than the previous once-over she had subjected him to, a still intense fire of self-consciousness licked greedily at his exposed form. Internally the young fan was fabricating his pep talk as he went along, with every heavy pause generating more and more uncertainty in himself. Ramona's powerful scowls piled on top of every passing minute to bear down on him with an increasingly crushing force, unless he could relieve the pressure soon he knew he'd be crushed beneath her oppressive pessimism.

"I think most people, or at least me..." He quickly continued. "Come to see fights, less for the wins, and more for the fight itself." Seeing the unchanged expression on Ramona's face he continued his impromptu explanation. "It's like... once there's a winner, the fight's over. All the excitement is gone. It's almost like, that for the fans at least, the end of the match is actually the worst part. Cause then it's done and you've gotta go home. The fans of a sport want to see that sport being played, you know? So even if the person they're rooting for ends up losing, it's still worthwhile just because they got to see them perform."

"Well maybe that's what the fans feel. But for athletes it's all about the win record." Ramona grumbled as her softening gaze dropped back down to her lap.